Prince Harry

(Nice picture eh? He looks like my Brother in Law.)

News that Matt Drudge has forced England's Prince Harry to abandon his 14 week tour of duty in Afghanistan four weeks short is interesting and disappointing at the same time.

Interesting in that the Prince got his wish (in part at least) to serve in his regiment as more than a REMF. One acquaintance of mine, a retired U.S. Marine, said it bluntly, "...he's living like just any ordinary grunt. He's been in some fights, he's engaged the enemy, he's seen the elephant.. .And that means that people in the UK are going to hate him for having a pair of balls the size of coconuts and showing the London Liberals what a Real Man looks like. It's been a long time since their was a real man in the Royal Family. Bravo, Harry."

The Prince has long chafed against the fame and attention that's part of being a Royal; He's expressed before a wish to be ordinary. These past 10 weeks of living like a grunt with his messmates in Afghanistan's Helmand province must have been gratifying. Nice going Matt, you disappointed a Prince.

Interesting, in that in exchange for unprecedented access to the Prince, the MoD managed to broker a deal to get the British press to cooperate this long in keeping the news of his deployment confidential.

When the news leaked, the MoD was quick to order an end to Harry's deployment out of security concerns. Most of the 88 British troops killed in Afghanistan since 2001 have died in Helmand, where British forces began fighting with the NATO-led coalition two years ago. Security for the prince will be higher when he returns home too, as now the Islamist death threats against him will be portraying him as a killer of Muslims.

Good for you Harry, I'm glad you had your chance to give em hell.

Maxim Blows it - forced to apologize to Black Crowes

Maxim magazine has had to apologize to the Black Crowes for writing a review of a New CD without listening to the cd. The Crowes first new studio Album in eight years, Warpaint, will be released Tuesday; Maxim had been provided only with samples for preview purposes. The March issue of Maxim panned Warpaint, giving it 2 and half stars out of five, saying the Black Crowes "sound pretty much like they always have: Pretty Boozy, competent, and in Slavish debt to the Stones, Allmans, and the Faces."

While I agree about the intellectual dishonesty on Maxim's part, is the review so bad? I've always thought the best thing about the Black Crowes was their consistent ability to infuse their bluesy Rock sound with a level of Soul that the Stones, Allmans and Faces could handily achieve, but did so all too rarely.

Pretty Boozy, Competent, and in slavish debt to the Stones, Allmans, and the Faces.

F*ckin Eh. Looks like I'm buying Warpaint on Tuesday.

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ps: review of Warpaint from Rolling Stone.
Rolling Stone's review